The Chain Warden Paradox
by Soulivium
Summary: One-shot. A summoner who serves as a healer at the Institute of War discovers first hand the strange condition of Thresh the Chain Warden. Nothing too extreme, but rated T for safety.


The Chain Warden Paradox

A League of Legends fan fiction by Susan Lee.

Written on October 22, 2013.

* * *

A sense of dread hung heavy in the quiet hallways of the Institute of War...

A young woman with silvery hair and deep-blue eyes walked silently down towards a large chamber where she was to meet ten bedraggled champions who returned from their battle at Summoner's Rift. Her pure white robes swished rhythmically as she walked.

For Trinity, a former priestess from a faraway world, her duty as a summoner at the Institute was to heal the wounded champions, regardless of their political affiliations. There was no one in Runeterra who could match her healing prowess. But if anyone asked, Trinity would only deny it and claim that it was her god who allowed her to have such powers.

However, today she couldn't help but feel a bit anxious...

...For this would be the first time she would have to tend to the needs of a certain undead champion.

She recalled that Thresh the Chain Warden and Lucian the Purifier fought against each other in today's match. Lucian was determined to destroy Thresh with extreme prejudice and to retrieve his beloved wife's imprisoned soul. Thresh, on the other hand, enjoyed toying with Lucian and taunting him by dangling his lantern at Lucian, the tiny jail cell that emanated with Senna's soul.

Trinity wondered if her god would answer her prayers to grant her the power to heal such an evil undead being.

Trinity then heard a loud, sudden bang of a gunshot. She heard an inhuman wail echoing from the chamber...

Trinity ran and yanked open the double doors of the chamber. There on the cold, runic floor laid Thresh, writhing in pain as he clutched his side. His soul essence seeped like ectoplasmic blood from the gunshot wound that Lucian had fired.

Lucian's exhausted teammates struggled to keep Lucian in control, but he tore himself away from them and walked briskly towards Thresh. The Purifier pointed his blood-stained gun at the chain warden to finish the blow.

"Die... You son of a devil!" Lucian snarled as he pressed the trigger.

Trinity acted quickly. She clapped her hands together and shot her hands outward towards Thresh. A seal of protection glowed in front of Thresh and absorbed the prismatic projectile.

"Lucian!" Trinity's angry voice rang in the air. "Have you lost your mind?! You know better than to point your weapons towards a champion outside of the battlegrounds!"

"Stay out of my way, priestess! I came this close to killing that abomination, and I won't let some petty loophole of a law stop me from delivering my justice!" Lucian spat.

Trinity saw that reason wouldn't stop the bitter Lucian. She dashed at Lucian and pressed the tips of her fingers at Lucian's forehead.

"Be at ease, Lucian... You must rest..." Trinity said softly.

For a split second, Lucian saw sorrow and sympathy in Trinity's ocean-blue eyes. Trinity understood that Lucian had every right to be angry. But alas, there would be a time and place for everything under the sun...

Darkness washed over Lucian's mind and his knees gave way beneath him. He fell forward, but Trinity had caught him by the shoulders.

"Members of the blue team, please take Lucian to one of the resting chambers. I will come and tend to your needs when I'm ready. Members of the purple team, you're welcome to retire to the resting chambers as well." Trinity asked as she laid Lucian on top of one of his teammate's backs.

The champions from both teams nodded in silence and walked out of the chamber.

Trinity then approached Thresh, who by this time quieted down and gasped in raspy breaths. He was lying on his back and stared blankly in the air, seemingly unresponsive to Trinity's presence.

"Let me see the wound." Trinity asked as she knelt next to him. She took Thresh's limp, clawed hand and brushed it away to assess his injuries.

Thresh's fist-sized wound crawled with spectral entrails that writhed like ghostly slugs who desperately sought escape. Trinity's heart sank in quiet disgust. She reluctantly closed her eyes and gathered her hands in prayer.

"O Divine Spirit, I beseech you to grant your powers to heal the wounded. Fulfill your promise which your servant holds dear to her heart..."

When Trinity finished her prayer, her hands glowed with powerful healing energy. She laid her hands upon Thresh.

Thresh's gaping wound began to slowly but surely close, but as Trinity poured out her holy power to heal Thresh, her mind became flooded with a cacophony of many voices...

Whispers of lost souls...

Wails and groans of men...

Shrieks and screams of women...

And heaven forbid, the pitiful cries of young children and the newborn... whose lives lost so soon after birth... and whose souls consumed so raw and unripened!

But amongst all the voices of the dead, she could hear one that cackled in sheer ecstasy.

The one who brought torture with the defiled chained sickle in his right hand and brought the light of despair in his left hand.

The one who lusted after the delectable souls and would never have enough to satiate his eternal hunger.

The one who drowned himself in an ocean of souls that were his bounty, his portion, his kingdom, his harem, his hive-mind concubine of madness!

Yet, there was one more voice... an ancient lovely voice who quietly wept for her lost love to return to the clarity and compassion he once had yet abandoned centuries ago...

...And Trinity understood.

She understood why Thresh was almost immediately accepted into the League. An attempt to pass judgment would involve infiltrating into the champion's mind.

Trinity wouldn't have been surprised if the summoner who tried to pass judgment onto Thresh would've died in madness. She wondered if the cries of the lost souls are what drove Thresh mad in the first place.

Thresh wasn't a just a warden. He himself was also a ward of his own prison. The fearsome shell of a body he had now imprisoned not just his own soul, but the souls of the dead he consumed. With every soul Thresh devoured, he owned not just their spirits, but their voices, and their past memories. He owned them all.

He was a world... a hell in his own right. He had gained the whole world and became the world, yet lost his soul to madness...

Trinity was determined to finish the healing process, but the voices of the dead rang louder and louder in her mind as minutes passed. The souls of the dead screamed, begged, pleaded with her desperately, goading her to release them.

What was she to do? Perform her duty to heal or save the lost souls?

Flashes of foreign memories overwhelmed Trinity's thoughts. Visions of gruesome deaths by chains, sickles, and unspeakable machinations. Piles of bodies laid in heaps. Myriads of souls bound by spectral chains and prepared for an unholy ritual. Armies of spectral warriors saluting to a powerful dark figure who wore a sinister crown and robes graced with the bones of the dead.

Were these Thresh's memories that were wrought with so much despair... or were they the memories of the fallen? Trinity couldn't tell which memories belonged to Thresh and which were those of the lost souls. Did Thresh even have any memories of his past life that was worth holding?

What was this Chain Warden's purpose of joining the League...?

By now, the choir of the dead shrieked into a deafening, bloodcurdling roar. Trinity wanted all of this to stop. She gasped and broke away from Thresh. Sweat trickled down from her pale face as she panted in exhaustion.

The noise stopped... Silence emanated once more.

Trinity's eyes slowly adjusted in focus. She looked at Thresh, who was completely healed. She had unwittingly closed the gates of death and did not let one soul go free.

"Hahahaha..." Thresh chuckled as he took hold of his weapons and got up on his feet. His chains flayed the quiet silence with clinging and clanging.

He knelt in front of Trinity and lifted her chin. He cocked his head slowly from side to side as he examined her countenance with rapt attention.

Thresh saw in Trinity's eyes that she was no stranger to death. He could tell that she had tasted a few morsels of death before.

"Are you not afraid of me?" Thresh questioned.

Although exhausted and overwhelmed, Trinity answered with a no.

"Hahaha... You'll see how fearsome I can be in due time..." Thresh caressed Trinity's face with the back of his hand. His sharp, clawed fingers inched slowly down to her neck before he grasped it abruptly. Trinity let out a startled gasp.

"I used to have a neck once... Too bad I lost it once I died and came back... Oh, how warm and soft your neck is... And how you look so much like her." The chain warden reminisced in a mocking tone.

At this, Thresh tightened his grasp on Trinity's neck. Trinity winced in pain, but refused to accept Thresh's invitation to let fear wash over her.

"I could snap your fragile neck here and now but then who would lock the gates...? Then again, no one can save them... Hahahaha..."

Thresh released Trinity from his grasp. He then took Trinity's hand and bowed his head to kiss it.

"I look forward to your company... I'm sure 'they' will gladly welcome you..."

Thresh got up on his feet and walked out of the chamber and into the hallway where the darkness welcomed him. Thresh's sickly green lantern grew dimmer and dimmer into the distance until he was finally out of sight.

Trinity sat alone in silence. She looked at her own hands in guilt and shame. She wondered why her god answered her prayers of healing. She wondered why she even prayed in the first place and instead could have finished off what Lucian had started.

Perhaps it was a test of faith? Had she failed?

Trinity didn't know for sure, but she couldn't help but feel that maybe... just maybe she could free all the souls that Thresh had captured.

And maybe... just maybe... she could set Thresh free as well.


End file.
